Rick­man stung by ac­cent

ALAN Rick­man was stunned to learn his CBGB co-star Keene McRae was from Alabama at the end of the movie, be­cause the new­comer mim­icked rock star St­ing so well the vet­eran ac­tor was con­vinced he was Bri­tish. Rick­man (pic­tured), who plays CBGB club boss Hilly Kristal in the new movie, is friends with the for­mer The Po­lice front­man and he com­pli­mented McRae on per­fect­ing the singer’s soft-spo­ken Geordie ac­cent. But di­rec­tor Ran­dall Miller ad­mits the young star with a bright fu­ture wasn’t all he ap­peared to be. ‘‘Keene McRae, who plays St­ing, was a cast­ing call guy who was amaz­ing and came from Alabama. Alan is ac­tu­ally friends with St­ing in real life and Keene came in and did an amaz­ing ac­cent. ‘‘He said he was from Birm­ing­ham, Alabama and we said, ‘No you’re from Birm­ing­ham, Eng­land, and you’re never gonna say you’re not,’ so he kept that ac­cent un­til he fin­ished shoot­ing. ‘‘On his last day we said, ‘Now you can tell Alan now where you’re re­ally from!’ He was as­ton­ished.’’ The new film cap­tures the sights and sounds of the New York punk mecca dur­ing its late 1970s hey­day and fea­tures Foo Fight­ers drum­mer Tay­lor Hawkins as Iggy Pop, Malin Ak­er­man as Blondie star Deb­bie Harry, Justin Bartha as Dead Boys front­man Stiv Ba­tors and Joel David Moore as Joey Ra­mone.